One of the most vital visual effects evolutions as the early 2000s progressed was performance capture. At Weta, the adaptations of The Lord of the Rings saw the company combine performance capture and animation for the creation of Gollum.
That made quantum leaps for the application of performance capture, and it ran somewhat in parallel with filmmaker Robert Zemeckis’ projects The Polar Express (2004), Beowulf (2007) and A Christmas Carol (2009). Also of note is the character work for the facial performance of Davy Jones in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest (2006). For this, a portable performance-capture facial rig was able to record the acting work of Bill Nighy on location as the character. In turn, performance capture has embedded itself as an established tool for any number of live-action and VFX movies.